Decision time for devolution

WHETHER or not Scotland opts for independence on Thursday, the one certainty is that the governance of Britain will be changed forever by the result.

Whereas a Yes vote will plunge the constitutional arrangements for what is left of the United Kingdom into complete disarray, a win for the No camp will trigger immediate negotiations over the plethora of devolved powers which the leaders of the three main parties, in their poll-induced panic, have fallen over themselves to guarantee Scottish voters.

Either way, it is clear that the English question cannot be avoided any longer. At the very least, a No vote must bring to an end the practice of Scottish MPs voting at Westminster on matters that solely affect England.

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That, however, can only be the start of a new devolution settlement which must answer not only the English question, but also the Yorkshire question.

To this end, the region’s political leaders have been putting together proposals for a new package of devolved powers,

The new mood for a move to a more federal Britain certainly shames the pitiful power-sharing efforts made so far by Westminster, which amounts to little more than lip service to 
the call by former Conservative Minister Lord Heseltine for the regions to be given much greater shares of Whitehall cash and far more control over how it is spent.

This must now change. With a population and an economy of similar size to those of Scotland, there is no logical reason why Yorkshire should be denied far greater devolved powers of its own.

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Yet great care must be taken over how this is done. Expensive tiers of bureaucracy with little in the way of real power – as with the regional assembly offered by the last Labour government – are not the answer.

The right balance between devolved power and proper public scrutiny must be achieved. But what is certain is that the issue cannot be delayed any longer.

The select few

Parliament shown at its best

THE inquisition of embattled South Yorkshire Police Commissioner Shaun Wright last week exemplified the best aspects of Westminster’s select committee system.

The forensic skewering of the threadbare excuses offered by Mr Wright as to why he remained in ignorance of the scale of Rotherham’s sex abuse scandal was a masterful piece of cross-examination by the Home Affairs Select Committee.

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Indeed, the only regret was that no further sanction could be directly applied by the MPs who had, nevertheless, fulfilled their role as representatives of the people of Rotherham who have been denied the chance to pose their own questions to Mr Wright.

Yet this is hardly the first time that select committees have hit the headlines for their ability to hold those in authority to account. On everything from MPs’ expenses to energy prices, select committees do their best to force the great and the not-so-good to explain themselves to the public in ways they might not otherwise be forced to do.

As Labour MP Paul Flynn suggests on the opposite page, it is the work of bodies such as the Public Accounts Committee, under the formidable chairmanship of Margaret Hodge, that is doing much to redeem the tarnished image of politicians and reinvigorate the relationship between Parliament and public.

There are still ways the system could be improved – committees could be given greater access to documents, they could make more use of outside expertise, they could talk to each other more – but as an example of Parliament working directly for the people it represents, they are hard to beat.

Parental power

The bank that keeps on giving

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AFTER the expense of bringing children up, nurturing and indulging them for the best part of 20 years and perhaps paying their way through university as well, it might be thought that parents had earned themselves the right to lavish a bit of money on themselves, should they actually have any left.

Not any more. According to the charity Shelter, the housing shortage, and consequent boom in prices, means that first-time buyers receiving financial help from the bank of mum and dad do so to the tune of £23,000 each on average, a huge commitment which, not surprisingly, sees parents raiding money saved for retirement or care fees.

Nor is this sum going to get any less in the years to come. Unless, of course, the cost can be slowed – or even reduced – by increasing the supply of low-cost housing.

But that would mean solving a problem which no political party has yet had the wherewithal to do.